April 20, 2009

Something wrong with a country where an idiot like Pat Robertson gets to air his insanity to millions of "fans." Speaking on the new DHS report (I over heard a Republican in a coffee shop complaining about this, saying that with his voting record and gun ownership, he was considered a threat?--I considered telling him that his low intelligence was his biggest threat to our country, but decided to go my own way), Pat Robertson says that the person who wrote the report is

"either a convinced left winger or somebody whose sexual orientation is somewhat in question."

Stupidity combined with tremendous arrogance and bigotry makes for a very bad combination.

9 comments:

As I call it the "Proud to be Ignurt" crowd is decimating what was once a proud conservative tradition in this country. Now it is nothing but a bunch of bubbas hollerin about "them others" (of whatever type).

I read portions of the report and I honestly can't decide who is the bigger idjut, that writer or Robertson. I'd probably have to give the nod to Robertson, but the DHS report is scarier, since these are people supposedly working for us that get to make policy.

I find the some of the domestic spying done by the government to be scary. This includes the stuff that is being targeted at "left-wing extremist" groups.

Glenn Greenwald has a somewhat melodramatic synopsis of what is happening. He does a good job of pointing out the hypocrisy of the right in this situation, but I recall that many on the left showed the same level of partisan ignoring when Clinton/Reno were abusive in the area of federal law enforcement and spying.

I am with Monk on this one, I am still wondering what was so scary about the report. I have no problem with some monitoring of violent extremist groups on either side, as long as it is done through the legal process. There are some radical leftist groups (not many, perhaps) who have done violence. And the rise of popularity of the right wing white pride groups is really scary. The part of the report I saw said that they were simply watching and warning about right wing extremist groups trying to recruit disgruntled veterans. Like McVeigh.

I suppose it depends on what is meant by monitoring and what kind of oversight there is. Maybe I am just being paranoid, but our gov't seems to have no qualms about conducting warrantless wiretaps against some people with minimal oversight, so it isn't that farfetched to think they wouldn't expand this. They have a history, even going back to J. Edgar Hoover, of doing this.

I agree with the ACLU and Greenwald. Some of this monitoring seems a bit broad and overreaching. I also things it is a possible waste of resources to monitor some of these groups. It just seems we are being very close to saying that dissent of any kind is tantamount to treason or some other criminal act.

Is there any good reason whatsoever why the federal government should be maintaining "files" which contain information about the pharmaceutical products which all Americans are consuming? The noxious idea has taken root in our country -- even before the Bush presidency, though certainly greatly bolstered during it -- that one of the functions of the federal government is to track the private lives of American citizens and maintain dossiers on what we do.I have been told by some that I shouldn't worry as long as I am not doing anything wrong. I am not doing anything wrong, but I value my privacy and don't think this is the direction we should be moving in. Unfortunately, many people seem to be ok with it. In the 90's, the right was very much against the abuses of Clinton and Reno, but had no problem with Bush expanding Executive powers beyond what the Constitution allows. The left ignored many of Clintons abuses and were vigilant against Bush.

Don't get me wrong, there were some progressives and libertarians that were consistent and groups like the ACLU won't put up with this stuff no matter who is on office.

I get the feeling that many of my conservative friends somehow put themselves in the same category as some of these frightening, violent right wing groups. I am not certain why, as I would not lump them together.

Rush Limbaugh is not Timothy McVeigh, for example.

That is were is seems to be coming from for me some sort of "joint" feeling that I don't understand.

And yes, were was all this angst a few months/years ago?

I suppose it is all about who is doing the 'monitoring' if it is 'your' team or 'the other guy".

Monk kind of nails this. It is fascinating to see conservatives lump themselves in with fanatics on the right.

BTW, Steve, I agree with you about warrantless searches and wiretapping. That is a problem, and I don't want to see that used against Peta or milita movements. But the outrage from the right appeared to be a complete misread of the DHS document. They jumped from "right wing extremist groups might target disgruntled veterans" (not an actual quote, btw) to "veterans are a threat."

The reaction was a little overboard, and like Greenwald pointed out, they probably had no problem with them going after PETA and Earth First.

I don't know if conservatives are lumping themselves in with fanatics, but are just worried that mild dissent somehow equals "nutjob". I suppose time will tell what comes of these reports, but I certainly think there is nothing wrong with a high level of oversight.

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